Video Writings by Artists (1970 – 1990)

— A newly edited book on video's early days

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Writings by artists have always played a crucial role in art theory. For the practitioners, they are a way to illustrate and explain their own ideas around their trajectory and working methods, identify trends they feel close to, articulate a broader reflection on a given medium, and perhaps challenge preconceived ideas. Just as film theory has incorporated essays, manifestos, and other written thoughts by filmmakers into a body of work that also includes the voices of critics studying the “new cinematic object,” this publication gathers together a number of artists’ writings—which were previously scattered in different publications—in order to revisit and reevaluate the early days of video art (up to 1990, a not entirely arbitrary time span). It adds a critical layer to LOOP Barcelona’s 15th edition, Winding the Clock Back: A Contemporary Archaeology of Video.